Office Building Virus Sterilization and Decontamination

How to Keep Your Workspace Safe from Coronavirus

On March 11th, 2020, Tedros Adhanom, the Director-General of the World Health Organization, delivered opening remarks that officially labeled COVID-19 as being a global pandemic. COVID-19 is the strain of coronavirus that is rapidly spreading across the world. Here is a direct quote from Adhanom:

“We have made the assessment that COVID-19 can be characterized as a pandemic. We have never before seen a pandemic sparked by a coronavirus. And we have never before seen a pandemic that can be controlled at the same time. We cannot say this loudly enough, or clearly enough, or often enough: all countries can still change the course of this pandemic.”(1)

The World Health Organization is worried about the coronavirus. One could even say the entire world is fretting about the virus. And while public health institutions will undoubtedly do their best to contain the virus, prevent its spread, and help those who are infected with it, what can individual people do to protect themselves? And just as importantly (since the virus is most easily transferred in places where large numbers of people gather) what can business owners do to protect their employees from infection?

“Environmental sanitation.” “Quarantine.” “Environmental contamination.” “Infection prevention.” “Sterilization.” These are all buzzwords we've heard lately, fear-inducing words that make us feel like we’re all going to get very sick, very soon. In the wake of the spread of COVID-19, schools, universities, and major businesses are closing, and events are being postponed or canceled entirely. And across the planet, entire countries are shutting down and asking people to stay at home and avoid contact with others.

Office Sterilization and Disinfection Applicable Strategies

Thankfully, there are several simple, straightforward, and almost universally applicable strategies that business owners and employees can do to keep their workspace clean. There are types of sanitization and household-use chemical disinfection strategies that can keep office spaces clean of viruses, bacteria, protozoa, and other harmful pathogens. Let’s take a look at some of the best practices for office sterilization and disinfection, and let’s see how these practices can be applied to your office space.

Decontamination Success - How to Kill a Virus Best Practices

While decontaminating an office or trying to address the coronaviridae in your place of work is a daunting task, there are several steps that employees, custodians, and other staff can take to protect themselves and their coworkers. So let’s take a look at that. You just found out your coworker tested positive for coronavirus. What do you do to make sure no one else at the office gets sick?

Self-containment. According to the experts, coronavirus can live in the air or on a surface (without attaching to a host) for six to nine days. So if someone at your place of work tested positive, the first thing to do would be to send the employees home and call off work for at least nine days. Close the office building down, and don't let anyone who isn't wearing the proper protective equipment enter your office building.

When tackling the decontamination of your office space, this is where things get tricky. If you decide to do this yourself, you must take precautions to ensure that you do not contract the virus. Wear latex gloves, a protective suit, a face mask, and goggles. Remember, coronavirus enters the body via a mucus membrane (think eyes, ears, nose, and mouth). Covering these areas will help ensure that you are not exposed to the virus while you are trying to disinfect the building.

When we compare coronavirus to other viruses, the same methods of sanitation apply. Though it is labor-intensive, you can decontaminate your workplace with much of the same environmental sanitation processes that would be used to tackle other viruses or bacteria. Just remember to throw your clothes in the drier afterward, because high heat kills viruses!

What Kills Viruses? - High Heat Treatments and Liquid Viricide

The prospect of disinfecting an office building by yourself might seem like a Herculean task. And there's some truth to that. There is a lot of work to do, and even if you are thorough in disinfecting for coronavirus, you can never guarantee that you are getting rid of all coronaviridae. That’s why it is a good idea to hire a professional office decontamination team to kill germs and to kill virus contaminants within the office building.

There are two critical approaches to destroying virus contaminations within a building. The first is the use of high heat treatments and the second is the application of liquid viricide. High heat treatments are incredibly useful, and they are an answer to the question, "What kills viruses naturally?" High heat treatments have no downside, and they can be utilized in an enclosed space that is under 10,000 square feet in size. Liquid viricide complements high heat because liquid treatments can be used to sanitize auditoriums, foyers, sidewalks, handrails, doors, windows, breezeways, large, open-air spaces, and other places that cannot be treated with high heat.

Dry Heat Sterilization - The Best Natural Disinfectant

At B.D.D.S., we use high heat technology to disinfect office buildings. Our heating equipment emits over 500,000 BTUs of heat into a confined space, bringing the temperature of that space up to a range of 160°F to 185°F. Our experienced technicians then use thermal imaging equipment to gauge the temperature of the interior space, ensuring that even hard-to-reach nooks and crannies within the space are brought to 160°F to 185°F.

Since coronaviridae die after a few minutes of exposure to about 131°F temperatures, and since we hold an office space’s temperature at 160°F to 185°F for several hours, we can be certain that our methodology fully decontaminates the area of viruses and bacteria. After high heat treatments have been applied to the majority of the office building, our technicians apply liquid viricide to spaces that cannot be disinfected with high heat. That includes door handles, sidewalks, parking garages, outdoor benches and lunch areas, staircases, elevator lobbies, handrails, breezeways, auditoriums, parking lots, etc.

A Global Pandemic and Why You Need the Best Disinfectant Solution

It’s easy to become fearful of the coronavirus. The media is making it seem as though this virus will be the end of us all. And there is a viable reason for concern. The CDC coronavirus definition suggests that COVID-19 is dangerous and can be lethal, and that humans should take every precaution they can to prevent infection. That’s why office building decontamination is so critical.

B.D.D.S. has the tools to decontaminate office buildings of coronaviridae and other contaminants. B.D.D.S. offers the most effective disinfectant solution by effective use of high heat and viricide. Hiring B.D.D.S. is a sure way to maximize infection prevention for you and your employees.

Call 1-800-704-4654 to schedule an estimate and to do your part in preventing the spread of this disease.

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